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Organizational Knowledge

Discussion in 'ISO 9001:2015 - Quality Management Systems' started by qmr1976, Jul 1, 2022.

  1. qmr1976

    qmr1976 Well-Known Member

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    So, during our last IATF audit, the auditor made a suggestion that we look at our organizational (tribal) knowledge a little closer. I gave her examples of how it's made available but I am guessing it needs to be documented a little better? The ISO standard does say it needs to be maintained and available, as necessary but I honestly don't even know where to begin to document this information without making it uber complicated! I realize this is just a suggestions but I always try to pick a few suggestions from the audit to establish continual improvement if it makes sense for our company. I thought it did to the extent of having something available when someone moves on from the company and people aren't fumbling around for information. One example that was given, which we already use are PFMEAs, but this information can be captured in a multitude of ways. Do we just document where this information is captured? Any examples of how you manage this requirement would be greatly appreciated!
     
  2. Miner

    Miner Moderator Staff Member

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    It depends on what tribal knowledge you want to document. Operator's or engineer's? With operators, try to capture the critical knowledge in the work instructions and process specifications. With engineers, capture it in design guidelines. Don't try to capture everything, only that which is critical to quality.
     
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  3. qmr1976

    qmr1976 Well-Known Member

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    That makes sense. Thank you! :)
     
  4. qmr1976

    qmr1976 Well-Known Member

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    And in response to your question....production and indirect staff. We have standard work instructions in place for the operators but it's hit miss with indirect employees. Since our jobs vary from day to day we don't document every little thing we do. (Albeit, in a perfect world if we had time we sure would probably do that). :)
     
  5. Jennifer Kirley

    Jennifer Kirley Moderator Staff Member

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    Tribal knowledge is always tricky.

    There is always some extent of tribal knowledge - for example, "Where is the cafeteria?" yet we really do need to have specific competency for processes that result in customer satisfaction. These must be identified, parsed out, fulfilled, and tracked to the extent that personnel competency is a performance metric. Tribal knowledge can be specific to particular machines' quirks and behavior. That's why competency is so challenging. It is essentially about the process, but can also be about very challenging particular aspects about that process, including the machine "Old Bessy" etc.
     
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  6. Andy Nichols

    Andy Nichols Moderator Staff Member

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    Ah, an example of "value-added" auditing? Not the auditor's job. Unless you can find examples where people are spending time trying to figure out what happened "last time we made these", what's the issue?

    Stop wasting your time responding to a slip of the tongue, well meant but ultimately useless comment, from someone you have no confidence even has a clue what they just said...
     
    Last edited: Jul 21, 2022
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  7. qmr1976

    qmr1976 Well-Known Member

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    I just know they suggest things for us to 'clean up' for them to evaluate if/when they return. Almost like saying, well, I'll give you time to work on this area and follow up on it when I return, which could then turn into a minor if we've totally disregarded their comments/suggestions.
     
  8. Andy Nichols

    Andy Nichols Moderator Staff Member

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    Yes, it's a well-known psychological trait, and is a form of what is known as "passive-aggressive behavior". I know of a CB auditor who regularly puts their clients through this... It needs to be stopped. Offering seemingly innocuous commentary and then threatening an NC is NOT acceptable.
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2022
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  9. qmr1976

    qmr1976 Well-Known Member

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    I totally agree....if I see it continue I will probably report it to our CB.
     
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  10. tony s

    tony s Well-Known Member

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    There's no categorical statement from the standard to maintain or retain a specific document to demonstrate conformity with organizational knowledge. If organizational knowledge is defined as knowledge specific to the organization that is gained from experience and shared to achieve objectives (as per the Note 1 under clause 7.1.6), then there can be many ways on how organizational knowledge can be determined, maintained and made available. Below are some of the examples on how an organization can demonstrate conformity with the requirements of 7.1.6:
    • debriefing sessions, discussions of what went right/wrong;
    • reviewing factors that lead to failures and successes;
    • capturing knowledge that exists within the organization, e.g. through mentoring, coaching, apprenticeship from senior employees;
    • induction or orientation sessions;
    • echo-training of acquired learnings;
    • benchmarking from other organizations;
    • gathering knowledge from customers, including external providers or business partners;
    • capturing/sharing best practices among the organization's departments;
    • integrating into the processes/procedures the solutions/counter measures taken to address problems encountered (e.g. nonconformities, nonconforming outputs, incidents, accidents);
    • documenting how processes are to be carried out properly;
    • maintaining document databases where people can access for their references;
    • stand-down meetings (i.e. safety or product related).
     
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